Supplier Communications Planner
Salary: Competitive Plus Benefits
Location: London Store Support Centre, London, EC1M 6HA
Contract type: Secondment
Business area: Food Commercial
Closing date: 28 January 2026
Requisition ID: 400045855
Why join us
Joining our Commercial Delivery team at Sainsbury's means being part of a supportive and diverse group of professionals who take pride in making a lasting impression in the retail industry. As a Supplier Communications Manager/Planner, you will have the opportunity to utilise your exceptional communication skills to craft engaging messages and develop impactful communications that will enhance our relationships with suppliers. You will play a vital role in keeping our suppliers informed about our strategies, updates, and important announcements, ensuring clarity and alignment in our business strategy. With interesting projects such as legislation updates and corporate strategy communication, you will have the chance to make a meaningful impact and contribute to our overall success. Join us and become part of a team that values effective communication, collaboration, and making a difference in the retail landscape.
What you'll do
Your primary responsibility will be to plan and control all central communications for suppliers, ensuring that they are well-informed and updated on the latest developments within our business. You will be responsible for writing, designing, and developing impactful communications that engage and appeal to our supplier base, utilising tools such as the Together With supplier portal and direct call-to-action emails. Additionally, you will publish and oversee the content of the 'Supplier Journal' digital magazine, collaborating with different teams to source stories and content. Gathering feedback from suppliers, you will ensure that the communications provide value and meet their needs. In collaboration with the Supplier Relationship Manager, you will also assist in organising important supplier communication and engagement events. Your strong communication skills, ability to create engaging content, and proficiency with various communication tools will be crucial in delivering effective and well-received communications to suppliers.
Who you are
You are a strategic and creative professional with a strong background in planning and creating engaging communication materials to enhance supplier relationships and drive commercial value. Your exceptional verbal and written communication skills, coupled with your ability to collaborate effectively with cross-functional teams and senior leadership, enable you to deliver impactful and consistent messaging through various channels. With a focus on continuous improvement, stakeholder engagement, and attention to detail, you drive the execution of centralised communications plans and contribute to the overall success of supplier communications strategies within the organisation.
Essential Criteria
- Proven current experience planning and creating engaging communication materials, with the ability to write, design, and edit impactful content in a large complex organisation
- Strong verbal and written communication skills, including the ability to develop clear, succinct messaging for varied supplier audiences.
- Proficiency with PowerPoint, Word and Excel, demonstrating ability in producing polished communication outputs
- Highly organised, able to plan and deliver against set milestones, managing multiple communication streams simultaneously.
- Proven skills and experience engaging and working confidently with senior with senior leaders to source content, align messaging, and ensure communications reflect strategic priorities.
We are committed to being a truly inclusive retailer, so you’ll be welcomed whoever you are and wherever you work. Around here, there’s always the chance to try something new - whether that’s as part of an evolving team or somewhere else across the business - and we take development seriously and promise to support you. We also recognise and celebrate colleagues when they go the extra mile and, where possible, offer flexible working. When you join our team, we’ll also offer you an amazing range of benefits. Here are some of them:
Starting off with colleague discount, you'll be able to get 10% off at Sainsbury's, Argos, TU and Habitat after 4 weeks. This increases to 15% off at Sainsbury’s every Friday and Saturday and 15% off at Argos every pay day. We've also got you covered for your future with our pensions scheme and life cover. You'll also be able to share in our success as you may be eligible for a performance-related bonus of up to 10% of salary, depending on how we perform.
Your wellbeing is important to us too. You'll receive an annual holiday allowance, and you can buy additional holiday. We also offer other benefits that will help your money go further such as season ticket loans, cycle to work scheme, health cash plans, pay advance (where you can access some of your pay before pay day) as well access to a great range of discounts from hundreds of other retailers. And if you ever need it there is also an employee assistance programme.
Moments that matter are as important to us as they are to you which is why we give up to 26 weeks’ pay for maternity or adoption leave and up to 4 weeks’ pay for paternity leave.
Please see www.sainsburys.jobs for a range of our benefits (note, length of service and eligibility criteria may apply).
